Alcohol may be legal, but it does more harm

“... Such restrictions might affect the legitimate drug industry”. Oh, you mean pharmaceuticals? Pharmaceuticals cause more deaths than all illegal drugs combined. And what about Asia’s and the world’s No 1 most harmful drug, which also happens to be the only recreational drug that is legal? Oh, sorry, forgot – it’s not possible to criminalise dealers and users of alcohol, because they’re among our VIPs. Indeed, the same old men who make and enforce laws are the same old men who drink Johnnie Walker and don’t mind when drunks go driving on roads and highways. When was the last time a person stoned on pot caused a traffic death or beat his wife or fought in a bar? Nearly never. I can’t think of a single incident, can you? Asian leaders need to do two things regarding recreational drugs: 

First: quit being so heavily influenced by the US Drug Enforcement Agency policy of criminalising tens of thousands of people for using recreational drugs. It’s known that the DEA pays large sums of money to Asian countries to further their inquisition. The DEA and Southeast Asian countries wind up inflicting a lot more harm than the harm from all recreational drugs combined. If in doubt, just ask the dozens of Thai women who are locked up for life in Asian prisons for the crime of doing one stupid thing: agreeing to take a package on a plane. 

The second thing Asian leaders need to do is educate themselves on the effects of individual drugs. For example: Hemp is illegal, yet it’s legally grown in China, and no one has ever harmed anyone while stoned on hemp. The reason: Hemp can’t get you stoned. Can’t even get you high. As for other recreational drugs – lawmakers need to gauge what harm is really being done. Is it worse than locking people up or executing them, as Indonesia is doing?

Ken Albertsen

Chiang Rai